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Honours Economics student Joshua Van Loon (pictured with the Chair of the Economics Department, Steffen Ziss) recently presented his research at a public poster session for Wilfrid Laurier University's undergraduate research assistants. This program provides funding for the university's best undergraduate students to pursue research opportunities.

Mr Van Loon studied how education is linked across generations in Canadian Aboriginal families. His findings are that, overall, highly educated Aboriginal parents are less likely to see their children achieve the same (or a higher) level of education than are similarly educated Canadian parents who do not claim Aboriginal background. Data that link the education levels of parents with those of their adult children are relatively rare in Canada, making it difficult to investigate the causes of this relationship, but work is continuing to attempt to determine whether there have been changes in the relationship between parents' and their childrens' education over time.

Mr Van Loon began his work on Aboriginal education as part of the required research coursework for the Honours Economics program.